The enigmatic year of 1978, a swirl of coke, Egypt, some truly inspired playing, plenty of schlock, ending with one of the top five best Grateful Dead concerts out there...1978 is the Persian circus tent of the Grateful Dead catalog, filled with freaks and temptations...

As good as 1977 is, the best of '78 stacks up favorably...in fact most of the Terrapin Station and Shakedown fare starts to loosen up nicely by fall...

Garcia steps into his singing quite a bit, I've heard it called "hamming it up", "over-enunciating", "affectation", but to me it's the studio affect...fine by me...in 1978 Garcia switched to the Wolf and really started to go to the scrub rock fanfare to finish songs...many songs got the fanning technique throughout the year...

Bob Weir starts up with that horrible slide in 1978, which is probably the biggest drag to the band's sound outside of the occasional bleating from Donna...

As to the shows, the best shows, give or take...quite a few are commercial releases...

12-31-1978--Winterland closing, the band plays up to the set list (Bill Graham asked them to pull out some nuggets for this show), my personal favorite New Years show, Sugar Magnolia>Scarlet>Fire opener, top 3 Ramble on Rose, Samson, Miracle, Terrapin (spot on), Playin, Dark Star, St. Stephen, Other One, Wharf Rat, Bid You Goodnight...official release no copy available

Don't miss out on 4/8 (Killer S>F), 4/12 (possibly best ROW JIMMY ever), 4/16 (another immense S>F and a Space>IKO in set 2), 4/24 (yet again w/the S>F and much more)...

'78 had a touch of "go for broke" rock and roll grit that perhaps '77 didn't chase as ambitiously, but lacked '77's precision and fluidity. When they connected in '78 it was out of the ballpark....when they missed it was a pretty ugly train wreck. Most of the year they connected.

This is great! I love Strat for starting this 'cuz I was really wondering about this year. I've listened to tons of shows from '78 but not in a manner that led to a fluid understanding of that year. 74, 75, 76, 77, and 79 yes but not 78. So as soon as I'm finished with every show in 76 I'll trip into 78 and listen to the above recommended shows.

78 is hit or miss for me too. There are surely some real highlights in there though, most of which were mentioned. I'm a sucker for anything 1966-77, but my interest tapers off in 78. Bobby's playing throughout the year especially turns me off a bit. I can't think of any other GD member whose sound completely changed like it did, esp in such a short amount of time. And most of those '78 interminable drum solos are hard to get all the way through. It's a real shame really, because the beginning of 78 held real promise, I love all of those California dates to open the year where they threw in the little trios and such. But then it just kinda went downhill. Wasn't it David Lemieux who said something like "After 2/5/78, it's all fluff?"

I hold similar opinions of 79. Sure, there's some great stuff in there, esp the Fall tour, but on the whole, it's not a year I visit too often. A show past 1980 has to be pretty special to get my listen (such as 8/28/81).

9/2/78 gets mentioned on most 1978 lists but it's absent on this one...why? Because it is an over-rated show. Great setlist but it really lacks that special ingredient for a great show. The more I listened to it, the less I valued it. Of course others may disagree with that which is why there are GD message boards in the first place!Ernie (aka StrawRider)

Agree with pretty much everything. I like 1/22 the best. Also note the huge TMNS, and what just might be the best Jack Straw ever.

I'm not the biggest fan of 12/31, but when it comes to set-list, you just can't beat it. I think the quality of play is better the night before. Check out little tunes like Jed, Promised Land, Passenger, and Loser. A good night for Garcia. A nice Sugaree as well. 2nd set all pretty solid.

Long time favorite 78 sleeper...and a Hunter Seamons Matrix to boot. Odd, kind of off balance set list with Scarlet>Fire ending the first set and the second set high-lite is Etimated>Eyes>Drums>Space>Iko>Sugar Mags.

Well 1978-04-22 has been in my playlist for some time now since it's another b-day show. However, I haven't done a lot of poking around in this year so THANKS! for what look like some grate starting points.

In my opinion, the very best year for being able to listen to everyone simultaneously. Not that that makes it the "best" in terms of mixes, i.e. I guess some folks might find it clutters, some sound folks find too many instruments competing in the same frequency. Bob is starting to get kind of "bell-like" and chimey. Jer is playing way down in the mix. Keith on the Yamaha(?) electric grand w/ lees dynamic and frequency range, i.e. een low notes have lots of higher overtones.

But along with the "sameness," it somehow makes it easy as the listener (for me at least) to hear them listening to each other, if that makes sense to you.

The 12/16 show features one of my favorite Scarlet> Fires of the era, hands down -- absolutely blistering. This is also an example of GREAT Bobby slide work from 78. It wasn't always good, but when it worked - wow.

Thanks for taking the time with this list. Great reference material here for anyone looking for a guide to the best of 1978.

Like many, however, I personally find '78 to be lacking ON THE WHOLE- there a are great shows, yes, but I always thought of it as "the poor man's '77".

You do have most of the highlights covered. The Close Encounters show, Red Rocks 7/8, 10/21, and 11/24 are my primary favorites when I want to sample some '78 and I feel that all are must-haves for anyone assembling a representative collection of late 70s Dead. The 4/16 show Earl mentions is also fun.

(The NYE show, however, would probably make my all-time top five most overrated shows list- looks great on paper, but the music mostly falls flat)

Strat- If you are back todoing these summaries then I am pleased aspunch- you were doing this when I first started posting here and you inspired me to pursue an encyclopedic knowledge of shows and best versions- I encourage you to continue- you have pointed out many a version that are now in my top ten

78 is more miss than hit fore me. I'm familiar with most of the shows you listed and do enjoy some. Over all I find 78 to be a sloppy year and Jerry's voice is obvioulsy on the permanent decline.

Don't get me wrong there's some great stuff to be had but over all I don't gravitate too much to 78. I did however in fact listen to 10-22 last night to hear that brilliant Bill G into before the very nice Scarlet Fire